Breaking Free from the Bipolar Pendulum: The Key to Stability in a Chaotic World
Life swings like a pendulum—sometimes with gentle rhythm, other times in violent, uncontrollable arcs. Leading up to February 27, 2020—the day I resigned from my six-figure new home consultant job, ending a ten-year career—the pendulum of my life was in full swing. I was hypomanic, functioning at high speed in an environment that never slowed down. The job felt like a theme park, with its decorated model homes attracting endless streams of buyers. But the manic pace was taking a toll—my blood pressure spiked well above my normal 110/72, and anxiety attacks on my short commute to work became resistant to breathwork. I asked my psychiatrist for anxiety medication, knowing something was off but also sensing that everything was happening for a reason.
The Bipolar Swing: Personal and Collective Crashes
I was diagnosed with Bipolar 1 in my mid-30s in 2002, after enduring intense personal and professional stress, compounded by 9/11. An estimated 40 million people worldwide live with some form of bipolar disorder. Bipolar 1 is characterized by severe mood episodes—from mania to depression. Since 2002, I’ve experienced three major manic episodes and two more minor ones including in 2015 leading up to the 2016 US Presidential election. The pandemic, resigning from a 10 year career in new home sales just one month before it hit, and menopause converged at once. The dysfunctional state of human relationships across the country and world on top of that resulted in a prolonged, low-grade depression.
Depression forces introspection. It slows the pendulum, making you confront the truths you’ve been avoiding. For me, that meant facing my shadows—the lingering self-doubt, the weight of others’ expectations, and the unconscious victimhood I clung to.
Mania was different—it brought intense energy, creative highs, and at times a dangerous detachment from reality. I’ve experienced three severe manic episodes, yet each time, with medication and self-care, I reclaimed a productive life. But depression—the inevitable counterweight—demanded a reckoning. As emotions surfaced, I had to confront tough questions: “Why do I feel, act, and think the way I do?” A great psychiatrist, which is sometimes hard to find, helped me learn what my trigger is for manic attacks: bottling up my feelings, emotions and thoughts. In hindsight, I was decompressing and processing years of built up mental “garbage”.
Understanding the Pendulum Effect
I first understood the idea of a psychological and spiritual pendulum when I read Balancing Heaven and Earth by Robert A. Johnson. The book describes the necessity of balance—between the inner and outer worlds, masculine and feminine, the eternal and the everyday. Johnson explains that just as a pendulum swings wildly if pushed too far, so too do our minds, emotions, and societies.
Gravity always corrects the swing. If one’s mood soars too high, it will inevitably crash past equilibrium into a profound low. The wider the swing, the longer the recovery.
The Pendulum Effect on Society
The same principle applies to economies, politics, and collective human behavior. We live in a world dictated by pendulum swings:
Bull and Bear Markets – Boom and bust, expansion and contraction, soaring profits followed by recession.
Political Extremes – Left to right, progressive waves giving way to conservative backlashes.
Social Movements – Periods of radical change met with waves of resistance and oppression.
Public Mood – Mass hysteria, media-fueled panic, and cultural obsession, only to be followed by apathy or distrust.
Society, like individuals, loses balance when extremes dominate. We are living through a moment of collective imbalance—global instability from a pandemic, divisive politics, eroding human relationships, and a widespread dissatisfaction with the status quo.
Breaking Free: Finding Balance in a World of Extremes
How do we stop the endless cycle of swinging from one extreme to another? How do we stabilize our personal lives when the world around us is chaotic?
The answer lies in The Middle Way—the radical path of balance. In Buddhism, the Middle Way, or Noble Eightfold Path, offers a guide to prevent extreme swings. It consists of:
Right View – Seeing things clearly, free from delusions and distortions.
Right Resolve – Cultivating intention rooted in wisdom, not impulse.
Right Speech – Communicating with honesty and integrity.
Right Conduct – Acting with mindfulness and responsibility.
Right Livelihood – Earning and working in alignment with ethical values.
Right Effort – Redirecting energy toward productive and meaningful pursuits.
Right Mindfulness – Cultivating self-awareness to prevent reactionary swings.
Right Union – Aligning thoughts, words, and actions to create harmony.
Balance doesn’t mean stagnation. It means recognizing when we are being pulled to extremes and choosing not to engage in the knee-jerk reactions that fuel chaos. It’s remaining calm despite what is happening in life, business or politics and choosing to listen and respond not react to emotions. In St. Kitts, West Indies there is a saying “rush slowly”, a nod to a slower, more methodical flow in life, business and politics. The Taylor Swift song “You Need to Calm Down” resonates with me because of the state of chaos and reactionism we’re collectively experiencing. In order to calm down, we need to slow down.
A Call to Action: How Will You Steady Your Pendulum?
The world thrives on imbalance—on people reacting instead of reflecting, on societies swinging wildly between ideologies, on markets crashing and soaring. But you don’t have to be part of the chaos.
Are you caught in the pendulum of reactionary emotions? Step back and ask yourself: Who benefits from my outrage, fear, or despair?
Is your life dictated by external swings—politics, economics, or social pressure? Start focusing on internal equilibrium.
Do you see society losing balance? Instead of fueling extremes, work toward sustainable solutions.
Balance is an act of resistance. The pendulum will always move, but we don’t have to be dragged along with it. Stand at the center. Observe the chaos without being consumed by it. Stability is a choice—one that begins within. When we slow down and calm down, wisdom and intuition rise from the noise. Will you choose stability today?